


Sharpshooting

by saltstreets



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: (unless...?), Canon-Typical Violence, Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, M/M, Masturbation, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Rare Pair Week 2019, Taunting, Threats of Violence, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-19
Updated: 2019-11-19
Packaged: 2021-02-13 06:04:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21489571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltstreets/pseuds/saltstreets
Summary: Naval justice is too good for him, Jopson thinks. The spectacle of a hanging is all an actor like Hickey wants.(i.e. the worst possible thing I could have written, for Irving's Funday Sunday. dig it!)
Relationships: Captain Francis Crozier & Thomas Jopson, Cornelius Hickey/Thomas Jopson
Comments: 14
Kudos: 67
Collections: The Terror Rarepair Week 2019





	Sharpshooting

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS A PAIRING I’VE BEEN DYING TO WRITE FOR AGES…these two make such excellent foils and I love it. Possibly my nastiest ship, too? They would take such bites out of each other. So of course Funday Sunday is the ideal moment for it. Or would have been, had I actually finished the fic on time, but you know what I mean. :3c
> 
> There are some Crozier/Hickey and Crozier/Jopson undertones implied in this, so if either of those is a hard dealbreaker, maybe steer clear.
> 
> **Rare Pair Week has been such a ridiculous amount of fun- massive, tremendous thanks to the mods who made the event possible <333 and of course to everyone who produced such insanely good stuff! This fandom never ceases to delight me.**

Jopson passes Crozier going in the other direction as he makes his way towards the great cabin: Crozier gives him a nod as he does. “Jopson.”

“Sir.” He’s expecting the cabin to be empty now, and so is surprised when it is not.

Hickey is there instead, packing away his caulking set.

“Mister Hickey,” says Jopson politely.

Hickey smiles at him, eyes crinkling up in the earnest fashion he has. “Mister Jopson.” He gestures to his kit. “Just patching a draft. I’ll be out of your way in a moment.”

“Not to worry,” says Jopson, and moves across the room to begin shuffling the glassware in the cabinet. It’s not what he came to do- he needs to strip the linens from Crozier’s bunk in the sleeping quarters adjacent and replace them with a fresh set, but he’s loath to leave Hickey alone in the cabin, even if he would still be just a few feet away and separated only by a thin bulkhead.

So he takes out a few glasses and gives them a judicious polish, occasionally lifting one to the light as if inspecting for cracks. There are no cracks, he knows. But he has the sense that Hickey is watching him bustle about as he rolls up his tools. Long years of being an invisible presence to a wide variety of scenes, from command meetings to officers’ bored dinners, the delivery of good news and bad, promotions and reprimands, have taught Jopson the art of being busy while still attending a room. He knows how to act the part of the steward intent upon whatever mundane thing he must do, all the while listening and observing and remembering. Crozier finds his memory a useful way of taking notes on the duller encounters with Sir John he must endure, and Jopson has to admit that he likes knowing the things he hears for himself.

So he shuffles glassware and keeps an eye on the room and is confident that Hickey can’t tell the difference between Jopson actually going about his day and Jopson simply burning time as he waits for Hickey to leave.

Jopson has seen the caulker’s mate at work before, attending to the many seams and joins that run between Terror’s decks, bulkheads, beams, and hull. He has also noticed that Hickey’s fingers are uncertain with his work. He will pull off a piece of oakum and then rethink his choice, not sure how much he needs at first glance. His waterproofing is clumsy and it’s always evident at first glance which seams have been repaired by Hickey and which by Mr Darlington’s far more practiced hand. Jopson has never thought of himself as a disdainful man, has never looked down on others. He doesn’t scorn Hickey’s obvious lack of experience or skill: God knew the Navy could be almost criminally undiscerning when it came to filling out crew manifests. But it does make a contrast to the way Hickey carries himself. Jopson has heard him talking to his messmates, and nothing in Hickey’s attitude or conversation gives away anything to suggest he doesn’t quite know what he’s doing. The man’s confidence would be admirable on some, but there’s something else about Hickey that puts Jopson’s hackles up, and so the self-assurance comes off poorly instead.

Now Hickey stands, giving Jopson another smile as he slides out of the cabin. No, something about him rubs Jopson decidedly the wrong way, and he’s never been the sort to _ just give people a chance, _ or other platitudes in the name of turning the other cheek. Call it a character flaw. He’s willing to be proven wrong, but he does not like Cornelius Hickey.

He turns back to the now-empty room and surveys it. There are two glasses of whiskey on the table- or rather, there is one glass of whiskey, and one empty glass with an amber ring curling at the bottom. The full one has a fairly generous pour, and when Jopson lifts it to examine the rim, he finds it seemingly untouched.

He glances once more towards the doorway through which Hickey had vanished. Interesting.

For a moment he considers pouring the whiskey back into the bottle, but while he’s _ nearly _ positive it hasn’t been sipped at he cannot be entirely certain. He drinks it instead, tossing back the glass in two easy motions.

He feels a little bit guilty for it afterwards, but not too much. It would have been pointless for it to go to waste, and he goes about the rest of his day with a comfortable warmth in his belly only slightly offset by his thoughts of Mr Hickey in the great cabin, of Crozier and the two glasses, ticking away at the back of his head until he settles down in his hammock that night.

  
  


Hickey wants something from Crozier, that much is obvious. He slinks about the wardroom and the great cabin as much as he can get away with, and the whole affair with Lady Silence reeks of an attempt to get into the captain’s good books.

It would concern Jopson slightly more if it weren’t also painfully obvious that Hickey doesn’t know the best way to go about getting that something. Jopson has known the captain for long years now and known him well. Hickey’s particular brand of prying flattery may work with some men, but not with Crozier. At least, Jopson doesn’t think so. Crozier’s increasing dependency on whiskey has begun changing little things in the man, and that distresses Jopson to see.

For this reason he is of two minds about the lashing that follows Lady Silence being dragged onboard: on the one hand, the door that Hickey has been assiduously attempting to pick for some months now has been decidedly slammed in his face. Crozier’s displeasure is radiating off him like shimmering waves of heat from _ Terror’ _s boiler. Hickey will find no joy from the captain down the avenues he has been pursuing.

But on the other hand, the grim satisfaction that Crozier is taking in the process itself unsettles him. Ill-tempered, pessimistic, and outspoken Crozier could be, for sure. Jopson has great respect and admiration for his captain, but he isn’t an idiot blinded to the man’s faults. But Crozier has never been petty, or cruel. These things are new, and watching Hickey’s teeth bared in a grin through the agonised tears in his eyes, Jopson can’t help but wonder what Hickey himself thinks of the new Francis Crozier.

The next time he is truly alone with Hickey is much, much later, and the man is lying on a cot waiting to die. There will be two executions today: Sergeant Tozer is two tents over, no doubt being glowered at by Lieutenant Little. Jopson had regretted the loss of Irving and been shocked by the brutality of what had been done to him, but Little had been Irving’s fellow officer and moreover friend for the past two years. Little had needed to look away, his face pale and ill when they had first piled into the medical tent to see Irving’s body, and Jopson hadn’t blamed him. Tozer may not have been the one to actually put the knife in Irving, but Jopson doubts he’s enjoying a terribly warm atmosphere with Little all the same.

In this tent, Hickey only smiles and gazes up at the canvas overhead as though he is lounging on his own time rather than facing down the barrel of a gun. He is languid, relaxed. But Jopson notices a slight tightness around the corners of his eyes. Good. Let the man squirm.

Naval justice is too good for him, he thinks. The spectacle of a hanging is all an actor like Hickey wants. A bullet through the skull- that’s decisive without the theatrics. That’s righteous enough for Jopson’s satisfaction. He thinks about the small body of the Netsilik child, bundled in bloodied furs, and grips his rifle so tightly the wooden stock creaks.

He doubts he’s doing too good a job of hiding his emotions, an unusual state of affairs, which perhaps is why Hickey choses to start needling him. At first the weak attempts at undermining are almost laughable, though Jopson supposes it isn’t the first time he’s been taken for soft. Being a steward and having what he’s been reliably informed are “pretty eyes” seem to indicate to a certain type of man that Jopson is somehow incapable of doing things like hauling in a line, or firing a gun. Hickey hadn’t seemed like that type of man, but who knew what was going on inside the mind of the weedy caulker’s mate. It doesn’t bother Jopson in any case, and he gets a dark satisfaction from being able to cut Hickey’s foray off at the knees.

Since he was shoved into the tent and snapped at to stay put Hickey’s had his hand resting casually on his stomach, fingers tucked into his waistband. Now he slides his hand farther, down towards his groin.

Is it some further attempt to disturb him? Since words hadn’t done the trick. Jopson can see the man’s hand working within his trousers, the fabric pulled taunt over his knuckles as he palms his cock.

He rolls his eyes and manages to ignore it until Hickey lifts his hips and pushes down the waistband of his trousers and long drawers to pull his prick out properly.

“Don’t be disgusting,” Jopson says sharply.

“’Disgusting’ is a subjective opinion,” Hickey drawls, wrapping long slender fingers around himself. He’s of entirely average size, but from the way he flaunts himself, rolling his thumb over the head of his stiffening prick shameless-as-you-like, anyone would think he was endowed with the biggest equipment on either side of the Atlantic.

“How do you like this, then- put yourself away or I’ll shoot it off. Objective enough?”

“As a condemned man,” Hickey says with hateful delight in his voice, “I wouldn’t be denied this final pleasure, would I? Do I not have the rights to my own body for this final hour?”

“As a condemned man you have the right to lie there and be quiet until your neck is snapped,” says Jopson.

“Very threatening. But you’re not as uninterested as you’d like me to believe, are you?”

Jopson fixes Hickey with an unimpressed look, and then shifts that gaze pointedly to Hickey’s cock. “Not much to be interested _ in. _I wouldn’t flatter yourself.”

“Had much experience to compare to, have you, Jopson?”

“Yes, actually,” says Jopson, a bit of a pyrrhic retort to be fair, but Hickey is about to be hanged and is a sodomite himself besides, so Jopson doesn’t quite care if he knows just where Jopson’s preferences lie. Who is Hickey going to tell? Who’ll believe him enough to make Jopson’s life difficult? It’s worth it just to wrong-foot Hickey for a moment, for the brief second of surprise that crosses his face.

“Oh!” Hickey laughs, a high, false sound. “Mister Jopson. That’s quite scandalous.”

“I don’t think you’re quite one to talk.”

“You ever do this for the captain?” Hickey jeers, spreading his legs and taking himself more firmly in hand. “Frig him off when he was too drunk to do it himself? That why you’re a lieutenant now with a fancy gold braid and not just a steward, wiping up after the officers have a shit?”

Jopson doesn’t have a gold braid, just a piece of meaningless paper and the far more important trust and respect of his captain. Hickey’s words incense him.

“Strong words from someone who was panting for Crozier’s approval the minute he stepped onboard the ship,” he hisses, leaning forward and shoving the barrel of his rifle under Hickey’s chin with a force that draws a sharp, painful intake of breath from the man. He wishes he could say that he doesn’t notice the gleam in Hickey’s eye that accompanies the movement, or that he doesn’t recognise it for what it is: arousal. But he does. The man is depraved, Jopson thinks.

“Does it get under your skin, that he never looked twice at you?” Jopson presses the rifle forward. “You fooled a lot of people. You didn’t fool everyone.”

“Does it get under _ your _ skin?” Hickey shoots back, “Both that he never did you either, and that I tried?”

“Missed the mark there, Hickey,” Jopson says. “I respect the captain. Doesn’t mean I want to suck his cock.”

“But there are other cocks you do,” Hickey grins nastily. “I’ve got one right here if you’re in the mood.”

Jopson can only scoff. “Not likely.” He draws back, removing the rifle’s barrel from under Hickey’s chin. There is a red mark where the metal had bit the skin, but not a large one. It’s already fading as Jopson settles back into his former position and notices with disgust and a tiny, horrifying spark of something that _ isn’t _ disgust, that Hickey has finished in his hand.

“Hope you enjoyed it,” Jopson says as scathingly as he can manage, furiously burying a few unwanted stray thoughts in the back of his head, shoving them down below all the other things he doesn’t want to think about, and then a bit deeper still for good measure. “A good use of your last hour?”

“There are worse things to do.” Hickey wipes his hand carelessly on the already-filthy canvas of the cot he’s lying on. At least cleaning it later is no longer Jopson’s job. He sounds contemplative. “Though better ones, as well. But I’ll have time for them later.”

“You can’t possibly think you’re going to walk away from this.” But there is a small traitorous doubt there. Hickey seems so assured. Even with the edge of nerves about the man, he still seems far more confident than he should have the right to be. No, Jopson thinks, Hickey has reached the end of the line. It’s the same as he’s always been: cocksure and undoubting, but the seams he had caulked on _ Terror _ had always betrayed him, coming out clumsy. The tar bubbled, wisps of oakum left behind on the deck.

Hickey only smiles that friendly smile that Jopson has never trusted. It’s a genuine smile, but one of a man who is delighting in something very different than whatever the recipient of the expression is supposed to be enjoying. The mouse smiles because it has spotted the cheese. The mousetrap smiles back because the cheese is in its jaws.

The time after that goes mercifully swiftly.

“You know, Jopson,” says Hickey conversationally as Jopson walks him to the newly constructed gallows, hand a vice around Hickey’s upper arm, “You’ve managed to pass yourself off far too quietly around here. I may have a reputation but seems to me, you should have one as well. I don’t mind saying that I can respect that.”

_ I don’t give a damn about your respect, _Jopson wants to reply, but he doesn’t. He keeps his mouth shut.

When Hickey lifts his chin to allow Jopson to slip the noose over his head, Jopson has an unsettling instinctive memory of Crozier doing the same while Jopson shaved him. Tilting his head to bare the line of his neck, Jopson with the glinting razor in his steady hand, ever so careful not to nick the skin. It had become an easier job once they were frozen in, but even when _ Terror _ had been underway on a pitching sea and in all the long years Jopson had been Crozier’s steward, he had only cut his captain a rare handful of times.

He had always apologised, and Crozier had always waved him off. “It is sometimes reassuring, Jopson, to be reminded that even you remain only human,” he had said once as Jopson dabbed at the small bloom of blood on his jaw.

“I will continue to work on it, sir,” Jopson had replied dryly, and been pleased with the subsequent laugh the remark had drawn.

Now Hickey exposes his pale, slender throat and Jopson standing behind him half-wishes he still had the razor in hand. Instead he fits the noose properly. Hickey lowers his chin, and the moment passes.

The fog is a veritable soup by then, worthy of any London night. Jopson stands at attention as Crozier speaks. He remembers the untouched glass of whiskey on the table in the great cabin, so long ago. He thinks of Hickey’s easy smile in the tent even with the barrel of Jopson’s rifle trained on him. He thinks of the satisfied gasp of Hickey’s breath as he’d tugged himself off. Hickey seems to only be half-listening to what Crozier is saying, standing insolently even with his hands bound and a noose around his neck. That awful confidence still hangs about him, as thick as the fog.

The man doesn’t deserve to speak, Jopson thinks derisively, but Crozier will follow naval tradition to the letter in this, unwilling to leave any space for the discontents he knew were among the crew to complain that Hickey’s death had been poorly done. So Jopson will listen, for the show of the thing if for nothing else.

He fixes his attention on the gallows, and Cornelius Hickey has his last words.

**Author's Note:**

> the title is like, 50% a dick joke. oops


End file.
